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Thursday, May 13, 2010

EPZs and Modern Slavery: Who Shall Tell Wanjiku the Ugly Truth - Part II

By Mwarang'ethe

Continued... But, what makes USA such a high cost nation which forces the industry out? The natural cost of a product is dependent on land rent, wages plus taxes, regulatory costs and profits. On may 1 2010, the DN reported this. "Revealed: How Kenya lost Sh700m in embassy land deal". Ignoring all other juicy stuff, let us focus on this statement. "On February 10, 2009, a valuation report by Teresia Kimondiu of the Ministry of Lands put the value of the land on which Kenya’s mission stands at Sh1.392 billion and the buildings at Sh129 million". Mark you, this after the land speculation disaster of the late 1980's which made Tokyo land more valuable than all of the real estate in the USA. We can see that, the land rent is almost 10 times the value of the bricks and mortars. So, who pockets this rent? The land lord (read land devil). Has he toiled so as to demand this tax from investors and workers? No. It is to afford this private rent the worker in Japan must be paid very highly which makes him unable to compete with Haitian worker. Consequently, so, as to avoid this private taxation, the investor moves his manufacturing to Haiti. It is for this reason, Singapore, whose land tenure is according to the natural law, is the magnet for capital from Japan, USA, Germany etc. (see Esau and Jacob Story at James Gichuru Road.

Likewise, in the USA, this offshore guy contracts a marketing company to sell the baseball in the rich American market. Just like the Haiti manufacturer, the American marketer is tasked to do the very least. As a result, the American marketer gets little payment as well. However, if the USA, UK governments collects VAT, it makes a lot of money when the sellers sell expensively stuff that costs cents to make in Kenya or Haiti. More so, since the UK government is a beneficiary of these arrangements via VAT, they can come around and fund the free education programme for children of the EPZ's worker. What a cruel deception is this?

So, we can see that, in this triangle, only a few guys sitting in the offshore who get over 80% of wealth produced are benefiting in the so called globalisation because via these complicated arrangements since these offshore guy pockets around 80% of the $ 15. If you have been asking why the top 1% dogs in the USA now control over 55% of wealth, the formula is here. In 1995, the Gap sold shirts "made in El Salvador" at $ 20 with El Salvadoran slave getting $ 18 cents. When the El Salvadorian slaves tried to ask for more in commensurate with their humanity, the Asian slaves called Gap.

The story does not end here though. In the USA, when a manufacturer moves to Haiti, he must sack some American workers. Simply, this is economic insanity of capital destroying capital. When they lose jobs, they either remain jobless or get other low paying so called service jobs of washing each other dogs, massaging each other and may be prostitution. For others who have jobs, wages must remain stagnant which has been the case since 1973 as Greenspan, the high priest at the FED confirmed at the "boom" time of Mr Clinton. This is nothing new though. The more slaves Roman Empire soldiers brought to Rome as prisoners of war, the more wages fell and more difficult it became to find work for “free citizens.” Who said history does not repeat itself?

To keep up with rising cost of living (remember that question of energy, money capture for speculation at the source which brings inflation?), the American worker has been forced to go into debts to buy the baseball, jeans etc from 3rd world. However, now, the American worker finds himself committing much of his income to debts given by the same bankers who finance outsourcing such that, he cannot consumer industrial goods. When this happens, the whole ponzi scheme collapses and these debts gets transferred to the already tired taxpayers in the name of public debt as we see now in the USA, Europe and elsewhere. What is interesting is that, the money given to these bankers is loaned again to the government at interest. In this scheme, we have witnessed the GREATEST TRANSFER of wealth in human history from the poor to the rich. In Britain, the 1,000 super-rich saw their wealth increase by one-third – or £77 billion – to a total £334 billion during 2009 alone. In other words, Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s £1,000 billion stimulus package all it achieved was stimulating the assets of the already wealthy. Translated, this is socialism for the rich, free markets for the vanquished masses.

As the Americans capacity to consume evaporates, some workers in the EPZ's must lose jobs. For those who are lucky to retain jobs, they must compete, i.e. further lower their wages to get the few jobs available. And, since our governments must pay their dollar loans which they take to buy local stones or create jobs for the restless young men, they must create more special trace zones to facilitate export of new clothes so as to import mitumba later. How can we call these free markets when the power of the state is used to vanquish workers? We are back to the age of mercantilism.

When all this is going, the American worker cannot see the reality because he spends more time in the shiny shopping temples of godless capitalism buying jeans and ipods to stick in his ears to drown his sorrows. Nothing new here once again. As the Roman Empire collapsed, the Roman citizens had a lot of bread and entertainment. By the time the masses woke up, around 1800 men were holding the wealth of the whole world as the world plunged into Dark Ages. After all, the Havard economist/priest preaches daily on the BBC, Fox News that, this is the most efficient way of conducting our affairs. In this "efficient" way of doing things, we sack the American worker and we transfer his work to a Haitian. In other words, we have capital destroying capital. However, since the Haitian worker has no need for pension, health care or education for his kids, which the American worker would have been paid, the guys sitting in Switzerland pockets the difference.

With a straight face, the pocketing of what in front of man and God and in justice and in equity belongs to the poor workers, they call this profit. That’s why the Forbes Magazine can announce to the mesmerised humanity how many billionaires we have created in the last two- three decades. Using these "profits" these evil men who eat bread of sorrow start speculating in stocks, commodities such as oil, food (as you talk about debe, another food crisis is on the way by the way) and land. In the midst of such orgy of speculation which completely neglects and destroys the real economy, the G7/8, World Economic Forum and other such useless gatherings where a few of African leaders are invited to add the dark colour, they announce to the struggling masses that, "we have high sustainable economic growth." We have read the same nonsense on this blog. Never mind that, we are wasting valuable energy as we noted here, to transport toys from China to the USA. But, who cares, the new technology is around the corner to enable the continuation of this economic insanity.

In the midst of this madness and ECONOMIC GENOCIDE, we are assured that, with the new constitution combined with Vision 2030, we will be a wealthy nation soon. For every reality, there is a fantasy. Let us investigate these claims. Let us recall the division of labour we mentioned above. In this sense, the productive activities that can make a nation wealthy must meet two tests. (a) Such activities should lead to production of valuable tangible/intangible stuff. (b) Such activities should be surplus generating economic activities that can be made available for future re- investment. Ignoring the distribution aspect of this surplus for the moment, we can say that, since our economic activities do not meet test (b), in other words, we specialise in unproductive economic activities (special EPZ's and coffee growing - Malthusian activities) we are going NOWHERE.

Furthermore, even if there is some little surplus revenue for re- investment we also have a major problem of its distribution. Under the private land ownership (absolute title to land), land absorbs almost all of the surplus revenue in form of rent. In addition to this, we have piratical monetary system that also extracts a very large portion of the surplus revenue from our economy. This extraction of wealth by the idle class is at the expense of the class that create real wealth. This class is composed of the labour and the real economy/industrial/agriculture economy. Once the industrialist/farmer who creates commodities we need and exchange with each other is starved of revenue for future investments, it follows that, there are no jobs for the labour. And even if there are jobs, so as to meet the unjust demands of land owners and the financial capitalists, the wages must be low as we see in the EPZ’s. Low wages cannot create an environment for industrialists to invest.

So, if this is the condition of our economy and the “new constitution” has not fixed it, how do you meet the economic and social rights as well as devolution demands? With all honesty, it is impossible to meet these demands. To believe otherwise, is to be stupid for it amounts to asking the question without bothering to answer it. We say it again. We are going NOWHERE until our Constitutions, Vision 2030's are constructed with this reality in the mind and not delusions and wild fantasies. Cheki vile huyu supuu wetu anacheka akisoma mambo ya economic and social rights.

Let us make some issue absolutely very clear. No form of government including so called welfare state can create wealth. All these systems of government do is to redistribute wealth. However, redistribution is not creation of wealth. It only shuffles wealth around from its most economically suitable uses toward purposes that serve the needs of the political class. If any property is forcibly made to serve anything other than its first most suitable purpose, its value is reduced. When it is channeled into purposes that serve the interest of the state, it is done at the cost of freedom as well. Now, we have crafted the economic and social rights. Fine, but, let us think through these delusions.

In introducing economic and social rights all we are saying is that, all should be wealthy for to have a decent house is being wealthy. We have also devolved some funds to the local areas. We are 100% in favour of devolution. But, it must be done in a more thoughtful manner. This calls for two things for sure. Massive taxation and debt pyramid. For the moment, don’t mind that, taxation and debt (public curse) are inimical to wealth creation. At the same time, we know this. Prosperity that will be taxed to build decent houses does not depend on having a saintly president or devolution, but, well thought out economic structures of a nation. If this is so, have we created the necessary economic structures? We have answered this question with emphatic No. If so, how do you provide decent houses? It is a delusion.We know that, fools love their calamity and they call their prophets lunatics. Nevertheless, we must give you a stern warning. We are giving thee, a hint of the past and the future that awaits us or even better, which is with us. In 1770, the East Indian Company starved 10 million Indians in a cruel famine made worse by the company's hoarding of limited grain stocks and its decision to raise the rate of taxation to maintain its revenues. With London (read Kenya/Africa) facing financial difficulties, it had to get bailout from this monster. This meant the government takeover by this monster of a company. It was in horror of things to come when in 1773, one American in the America colonies warned that: "America is faced with the most powerful trading company in the universe, an institution well versed in tyranny, plunder, oppression and bloodshed." And, whose tea was dumped in Boston in 1773 at the start of the American Revolution? It was this monster's tea.

If the average Joe in America was not spending all his time in the shopping temples, buying with borrowed money "cheap" stuff, he would have saved the humanity by dumping the jeans from special Athi River EPZ's into the Boston sea. Unfortunately, if the Western average citizen is not in the shopping temples, he is watching the American idol; Britain has Talent and Desperate Housewives. Consequently, he cannot hear the trumpet warning of the coming economic strangulation issued by the gods of money at the IMF. The Fund has calculated that almost all advanced economies need to tighten fiscal policy (increase poverty) significantly in the coming decade in order to stabilise debt at 60 per cent of national income by 2030 and the tightening needed in the US, Japan and the UK is just as bad as that required in Greece, Spain, Ireland and Portugal. In other words, Greece is the opening short of coming feudalism for we are back to the past. This we see in the FT "Dangers loom beyond eurozone.

From this, we see that, the American independence was sparked as much by hostility to corporate monopoly which included money monopoly as it was to taxation without representation. Are we today not dominated by modern corporate monopolies which are nothing but the East Indian Company? Doesn't the Kibaki/Raila/Kalonzo, Uhuru, Musalia, Obama’s government constitute taxation without representation (read taxation with impoverishment)? Therefore, since the conditions that fuelled the American Revolution have been met, let us perpetuate an honest indignation against these enemies of mankind.

Humanity is at crossroad for financial capitalism has killed its host, i.e. industrial capitalism/real free economy. If the ongoing economic collapse is not handled with appropriate wisdom which unfortunately Nero, oh, no, Obama has completely failed to show, it will plunge humanity in to a deadly 3 World War. The consequences will be too devastating to contemplate with so many nations armed with nuclear weapons. Just watch how the Euro zone is now jumping from the Titanic ship to Lusitania ship. There is nothing new here because; we saw these same games in the 3rd century after Christ with the monetary collapse of the Roman Empire.

In these uncertain times, there is too much to say, but, let us end with the wisdom of Martin Luther King who said, that, it comes a time when silence is betrayal. Time has come for men and women of goodwill to be maladjusted to an economic system that takes the necessities from the many to give luxuries to the few as Martin Luther said. See his speech here.

While at it bear in mind two very important things:

(a) The fight against Moi, Kibaki, Raila, and Mbeki is all in vain. What we have in place is an Invisible Government of Monetary Power which is worse than monarchical power for it is well versed in tyranny, plunder, oppression and bloodshed. Moi, Kibaki, Raila’s are mere figure heads. In other words, politics and political analysis dominated by personality analysis is a total waste of time and energy which only leads to frustrations.

15 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Mwarang'ethe,Great piece. That said you guys are a funny lot. Here you are pretending to be intellectuals who are easily excited with cheap stuff just a fresher in a philosophy 100 class. As an ex-civil servant, I will tell your lot without any fear of contradiction/s that all your ideas here fades far in comparison to so many brilliant and excellent blue prints gathering dirt in many govt shelves.

You may hate it but we are not where we are because of lack of brilliant ideas like those penned here by Mwarang'ethe, NO. The missing link is IMPLIMENTATION, IMPLIMENTATION and IMPLIMENTATION.

Until we elect leaders worth their name and not tribal warlords, all your good rants itakuwa kama kupigia mbuzi guitar.

So fellow Kenyans stop deluding yourselves that your LOFTY ideas here in KK is the alpha and omega of progress/intellectualism. Far from it except for the lazy minds reading them for the first time.

But I don't blame your lot because you don't know you are wasting time re-inventing the wheel. As put to you earlier UTOPIAN prescription never goes past acadmeic discourse.

This is not to take anything from Mwarang'ethe but just reminding the good Kenyan to stop preaching to a choir.

Agreed,fresh university graduates delude themselves they are just what the doctor ordered for a sick society.That is before reality sinks in and their earlier enthusiasm slowly fades away and they are faced with the stark realities of a man eat all society.What the heck,even the miraa chewing layabouts common in most estates in Nairobi know and sing all of Bob Marleys lyrics.Mwarangethe,if you are employed,stop STEALING your employer time posting on an obscure platform.If you are self employed,use your timhttp://kumekucha.blogspot.com/

....continued from above,and if you are self employed,concentrate on creative and innovative ways to generate your OWN wealth!But if you are an idler like those mentioned above,then you are in the right place...!!

How street evangelism and cheap Reggae rants makes intellectualism is beyond me. And you are egged on by fellow jjuvenile weed-smokers ati wengine ni naysayers or haters. Well, good luck in your sermons.

'In other words, politics and political analysis dominated by personality analysis is a total waste of time and energy which only leads to frustrations.'

Thank you sir for saying it as it is.In other words Kumekucha should stop discussing people and discuss ideas instead since simple minds discuss people while great minds discuss ideas. Ideas are what will build Kenya not daily suffocating gossip from we know who..

Anyang Nyongo has also written very nice piece of how we can improve our economy and it's still collecting dust at the Ministry of Planning.

Someone mention about implementation being a problem and not just lack of knowledge in the entire Kenyan society, I think I can go further and say there has been lack of implementation due to corruption, tribalism, poor governance and poor leadership.

Therefore should we start with changing leaders, and at the same time reduce tribalism, increase good governance and lastly implement these ideas? I say yes, and that's why politics still play a major role in Kenya if we want the good ideas to be implemented, and that's also why I will not discourage politics here.

My stand is that when we get a chance to move forward, irregardless of it being only a foot forward, even if we wanted to move miles forward, we should not live that chance because it's not what we wanted but we should take it. We may decline it and loose everything - that's why I still support the constitution.

WEB OF DECEPTION: THE MEDIA CRITICThe guy who runs Media Madness - www.frankierants.com goes by the the ficticious name of Pius Kamuiru. He has caused many a media personalities sleepless nights and mad blushes over the many posts on his blog. More oft that not, the posts are slanderous and at best aimed at cripling the media personality who makes the topic of the day.Here is what most people do not know, the blog is run by one person who sits at an office - that is if there is one - all day moderating the comments.Most of the 'die-hard followers are actually alliases created by the the same person who posts the day's big stories' All this to keep the forum heated.Take for example Lentils, Geofrey, Mimi, Nashangaakuwamkenya, Green Fingers, Kubaff, Makmende and even Yeye who later became the 'Admin'. He lies that theye are eight poeple contributing to the webblog but it's a lie.'Pius' has gained a fanatic following that is a keen to lynch mobs - that is if he is not all the guys who comment. They tear into the media personalities that 'Pius' doesn't approve of mercilessly. All this under the cover of anonymity because he doesn't want the fame.How many times has he deleted posts and reposted them because the facts are wrong? Numerous times.Cleverly so, that is why 'Pius' has deviced ways of criticing the media by creating alliases.'Pius' is Francis 'Gamu' Munga Karugah. To understand the motivation behind Francis'rants about members of the fourth estate, you need to know that he has tried countless times to get into the main stream media, especially Capital FM to no avail.That is why half of the time he is throwing punches at the radio station.The 22-years old who had created a twitter and Facebook (which he closed after his identity was leaked on Kenyalist.com.Oh, NB/ i have emailed this to all media houses .) where he (stalks) prominent media personalities in the hope that he will get some information. On Facebook he used Gamu Karugah being the cyber-bully he is, he protected his profile from coming up on google and facebook searches. On Twitter he was fkarugah.The official Twitter account mediamadnessk has been protected so that he can vet you before he accepts you.He has also acquired a number of sources who tattle tale on thier collegues from each media house - most of whom are equally bitter and have a score to settle. As a amember of the fourth estate, i wonder, how, as media can you be so divided to a point where you dish out on your fellow colleagues? Karugah got all of you on that one. He is now smilling all the way to the bank.How can a 22-year old who doesn't have a degree pees all over your credibility? He only has a diploma from Kenya Poly for Enterprenueral Development. It's very hilarious this....For those who would love to sue for libel, Francis Karugah's email is fkarugah@yahoo.com, Kamuiru@gmail.com, Francis@daproim.comAnother person probably who has employed Karugah or are in partnership is Mandah Ngugi the CEO of Transcrypt Global, the company hosting the website. Mandah offers the IT suport. Karugah who has called many media personalities gay, has a boyfriend in the US who pays for the webhosting called Mark Thiongo. He is curently studying at the Green Mountain College, somwhere in the USA bunduz where Mark was running for Student Senate President.

Philip said... Anyang Nyongo has also written very nice piece of how we can improve our economy and it's still collecting dust at the Ministry of Planning.

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The question is, why is he and the government he is part of, implementing EPZ (slavery wage system) and so called Vision 2030 (read rentier class manifesto) and not his plans?

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You may hate it but we are not where we are because of lack of brilliant ideas like those penned here by Mwarang'ethe, NO. The missing link is IMPLIMENTATION, IMPLIMENTATION and IMPLIMENTATION.

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Fine. Please let have the reference to these documents you are aware of, which deal with two issues:

(a) how to move Kenya from Malthusian activities to surplus generating economic activities, and

(b) how to ensure that, the wealth producers retain the wealth they create and is not taken by the rentier class.

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What the heck,even the miraa chewing layabouts common in most estates in Nairobi know and sing all of Bob Marleys lyrics

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We can smell your contempt for the poor. Good for you Sir.

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So fellow Kenyans stop deluding yourselves that your LOFTY ideas here in KK is the alpha and omega of progress/intellectualism. Far from it except for the lazy minds reading them for the first time.

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Does this apply to all who post articles here or just Mwarang'ethe? If so, why?

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That is before reality sinks in and their earlier enthusiasm slowly fades away and they are faced with the stark realities of a man eat all society.

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Can't you see from the title of this essay that, we are aware of the reality you call man eat man society? Surely, a man ought to read and understand before he starts hitting the key board like an obsessed monkey.

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if you are employed,stop STEALING your employer time posting on an obscure platform

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In your stupidity you think one can only be usefully engaged when he is producing unncessary shirts and toys for grown ups at EPZ at slavery wage or moving papers around in so called offices?

I have not read your article but am sure it is interesting and stimulating. You see, this place is not for serious stuff.

I agree with what the ex civil servant has said. A friend of mine told me that when he went to canada to study for masters degree in development economics, he found that one of his teachers was some one who used to do consultancy work for the kenya government. The teacher told my friend, a civil servant then, that all he (my friend) needed to do to pass was to reproduce the papers they (civil servants) write. The teacher said "you people write such good papers, if only you would implement them"!

"The question is, why is he and the government he is part of, implementing EPZ (slavery wage system) and so called Vision 2030 (read rentier class manifesto) and not his plans?"

I support your views that you have been writing here however the question I have is, "How can it be implemented?"

Recently I remember arguing that at the moment the resources are not there to implement it since it still doesn't have the support of many people, and those who have read haven't understood it fully so that they can easily be influenced against it. You know that what you are raising will not be supported by the clique who control the vast wealth of this world so that when it comes to thinking of implementing your ideas you will never put politics aside.

That's the reason we should hold any opportunity we get.

Yes devolution is about distribution of wealth but not about creation of wealth by the poor, however in the end there are many people who are going to gain, even after being taxed. This little gain has the power to bring more changes. If I didn't have food on my table I couldn't even thought of reading your articles, but I support it since there are issues that are no longer a problem to me and that's why I can put time aside to read your articles.

Maybe before 2002, during Moi's rule I couldn't read it but since then the there has been slight improvement so that many people have source of income, including me, and this was brought by politics. The slight change in the constitution in 1990 played a major role.

In the same way the changes in our current constitution can play a major role in ensuring your ideas are implemented since the poor will slightly be empowered.

Refer to you earlier post on energy 'strategic' wars.See also this article: http://www.capitalfm.co.ke/news/Kenyanews/Four-African-states-sign-new-Nile-treaty.html#sucess

I gather that1. Kenya has completely outmaneuvered by Egypt.2. Egypt threatens sanctions against Kenya if Kenya if Kenya acts against the treaty.3. Kenya continues to play second fiddle to Egypt, i.e. it's Egypt that always 'helps' us and never the other way round.4. Recently, Egypt threatened sanctions when we tried to block their rice owing to rules of origin. We had to let in the consignment.5. What is the EU interest in this issue as they are favouring the Egyptian position?.

"It is for this reason, Singapore, whose land tenure is according to the natural law, is the magnet for capital from Japan, USA, Germany etc."

How much foreign investment has Singapore attracted with its unique land tenure system? Will Singapore be immune to the effects peak oil, finite resources and currency collapse in the near future? Lastly, doesn't Western capitalism has an exit strategy for the inevitable depletion of the earth's resources?